Papers of Ethel McLean Johnson, 1918-1945 (inclusive) 1919-1932 (bulk)

Ethel McLean Johnson, public official and writer, was born in Brownfield, Maine, in 1882. She attended the Parsonfield Seminary and the Western State Normal School; she was graduated from Simmons College in 1910 with a degree in Library Science and in the same year received a Litt. B. from Boston University. She was employed by the Women's Educational and Industrial Union, 1910-1918, and in the summer of 1918 was the Secretary of the Congressional Committee, Massachusetts Woman Suffrage Association. She became a member of the Massachusetts Minimum Wage Commission, 1918-1919, and served as Assistant Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Labor and Industries, 1919-1932. Johnson was appointed Minimum Wage Director of the State of New Hampshire, 1933-1935 by Governor John Gilbert Winant, and assisted in organizing the New Hampshire Commission on Interstate Compacts. From 1935 to 1939, Johnson worked under the direction of Winant at the International Labor Organization in Geneva, and was Acting Director of the Washington office of the International Labor Organization, 1939-1943. From 1943 to 1946, Johnson was Special Assistant to Ambassador Winant at the Court of St. James. A prolific freelance writer, Johnson spent a busy retirement in Brownfield writing reports, articles of news and opinion, and poetry. Her last years were spent in a nursing home in Florida.